


Equilibrium

by veridical



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Could be gen or pre-slash, Gen, Introspection, Spoilers for Desolation of Smaug, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 22:28:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1099314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veridical/pseuds/veridical
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Trust is gained as easily as it is lost. (Spoilers for Desolation of Smaug.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Equilibrium

**Author's Note:**

> This is definitely movie-based, but ignores the way they seem to spend no more than a day at each location. Let's just assume we weren't shown some of the days.
> 
> Russian version [here](http://verit.diary.ru/p194178126.htm).

Whatever he'd imagined would happen after Carrock, it wasn't this.

It's not that Thorin sits by him by the fire, although he does sometimes, when they are both not so tired they fall asleep the minute they hit the ground. It's not that they sometimes spend their time talking while on the road. Or, more like, one who isn't exhausted would be speaking and the other one listening. Bilbo supposes what they have can't even be described as 'conversations'. Yet they don't feel one-sided, somehow.

But it isn't that.

Thorin trusts him.

It's small and indiscernible until he begins noticing it, and then he can't stop.

Thorin would ask him to to gather firewood, or help with the dinner, or, most of the times, sneak out to see the road ahead. Bilbo accepts it and follows with a quiet grace. Yet the feeling doesn’t come from his words or orders, meaningful as they might be. It’s what’s lying underneath, it’s the way Thorin would say this or that. It’s the way he doesn’t say it to prove he doesn’t doubt the hobbit anymore, but simply because he trusts him to carry it out. The way he does actually listen when Bilbo voices a concern.

And that’s the thing-- he got used to the way Thorin would always dismiss him, Bilbo discovers with mild surprise. He wouldn't stand for it, but in the end, he did get used to never being told to do anything, even when it concerned something simple, at Thorin scowling at his mistakes and doubt always lurking in his expression whenever he happened to throw a glance at the burglar.

Now - he feels something profound shift in the way Thorin regards him, and it's as sudden as it is complete, as if a lever has been pulled, and now he's being flooded by trust where previously none existed. Bilbo is not really certain what to do with it. He has some friends back in the Shire, of course; though he is not so sure now whether he should count them as such. He never looked for anything beyond a pleasant aquiantanceship before, quite content with the things were. And yet. He knows, without doubt, that at least some of the other dwarves do trust him and believe in him, but not the way Thorin does. This feels real, absolute and final, and sometimes so palpable he thinks he could reach out and touch it.

Bilbo manages to push those thoughts to the back of his mind - until these idiotic, blasted dwarves are locked up and he's freeing them, how could it be otherwise-- and he makes the mistake of looking in Thorin's eyes.

Unabashed, unquenched, yet silent hope is shining in them-- Bilbo shakes his head, grins a little desperately, opens the lock, and just as he's scrambling away towards the next cell, Thorin says behind him quietly, "I knew."

Bilbo believes he can almost hear the smile in his voice. He doesn't have time to glance at him, and he's not even sure he could do it, could bear the weight of Thorin's belief in him. But he can't doubt the words, can't ignore the emotion behind them.

Suddenly it's very big, bigger than a simple hobbit can manage.

 

It grows.

It grows quietly. They don’t speak that much. It’s okay; Bilbo doesn’t trust the words to carry out his meaning. And what would he even say?

He climbes up the slopes, mountain looming before them, while Thorin quietly tells him about his family, and-- that's something new. He spoke of the happier days of Erebor, of its splendours and vast halls before, while they were gathered around the fire or when Bilbo found himself falling into step beside the dwarf in Mirkwood, Thorin trying to distract them both from the increasingly suffocating forest.

This, this is different. He listens to the tales of Thorin’s younger days, of the way he and his sister would always sneak out to the forge, their brother never following, but always covering for them, of how they all changed over the years, but the bonds never broke, of the way Dís would’ve wanted not only Fíli and Kíli to stay behind, but him as well. Of his quiet father and cheerful mother, and his formidable grandfather. He doesn’t keep more tragic moments to himself, but he spares Bilbo (and, the hobbit suspects, himself) the details.

He wants to ask if this was brought about by Kíli and Fíli staying behind in the Laketown, but holds his tongue.

 

_You can't trust me_ , Bilbo's thinking frantically, _Not when I can't._

The ring's gripping his finger, but it feels like his whole being. It's more hot than the breath of the dragon, more terrible than the enormous beast beside him, more dangerous than the possibility of being eaten alive. He tugs it off.

Smaug is talking, and Bilbo hears himself answer, voice shaking, blood rushing in his ears. He supposes that's what he's been sent here for - to reason with an enormous firebreathing dragon. He might be the only one who can.

But it’s all in vain, for he has to put on the ring again.

_You can't trust me_ , he thinks, never doubting Thorin. Not for a second.

 

Thorin runs after him, yet Bilbo can't find it in himself to be surprised, or annoyed, or glad, or - anything, not with dragonfire around the stone pillars.

Thorin points the blade at him.

Neither trust nor doubt lies in his eyes. Bilbo can't read them. Maybe it's the price he must pay for that hint of the possibility of doubt he felt when Smaug described the power of the Arkenstone to him. He knows that this is where it begins, this is the point from which they can't ever reach the silent equilibrium of trust. There's poison in his heart, poison in his ears, Smaug's words spreading through his blood veins. There's poison in his waistcoat pocket.

Thorin doesn't look mad-driven. He doesn't look like himself either.

But what does Bilbo know of Thorin?

He doesn't look like he recognizes the hobbit either.

He lets himself forget, watches Thorin order them around, order him around, even when Bilbo's ready to run after him. He lets himself think it is over, that it was never there to begin with. Surely he... misunderstood. Bilbo looks briefly at Thorin, and he's more like himself than he ever was outside the Mountain. Thorin’s looking at him, too-- but there can't be any distractions now. He keeps going.

He rushes after the dragon and through the gates and breathes out the hot-cold stale mountain air.

The poison remains.

**Author's Note:**

> When overwhelmed by feelings, throw them in a fic. They say it helps.


End file.
